South Carolina Lowcountry is a quiet coastal town, and the famous Parris Island training base is located next to this town. The Paris Island Boot Training Base was established in 1915 and is one of the oldest Boot Training Camps in the United States. The base is huge and well-equipped, providing a large number of qualified soldiers to the US military every year. According to the data description of the training base, one out of every ten U.S. recruits completed recruit enlistment training here.
Paris Island
The irritable instructor
However, most Marine soldiers call the training base "Crucible" because before they officially become Marines, they need to undergo a 13-week enlistment training here. The only two things that impressed them the most: the 54-hour "Crucible" training program and the instructor's voice and filthy rebuke.
Female recruits account for 25% of the number of recruits in this training base
"Crucible" project is easy to understand. It is a 54-hour high-intensity training. In this project, soldiers only have a minimum rest time and food amount. Generally, this project is the last item in the training plan. And rude instructors are difficult to accept, and the instructors here can easily remind new recruits of the plot in the movie "All Metal Case".
"All Metal Case" Instructors scolded
For example, according to the process, after the recruits were still wearing civilian clothes on the first day, they needed to line up to call a landline to report their safety to their homes or local recruitment offices. At this time, several instructors ordered them to constantly pick up the microphone and put down the microphone behind the soldiers who were making the phone, so that the recruits did not know whose orders they should obey. As long as the recruits hesitate, they will be scolded by the instructor at a very high volume and filthy speech. Such scolding will accompany them for thirteen weeks. Most people cannot understand why the instructors here are so irritable, which actually needs to be viewed in combination with the strict hierarchical system within the US military.
The strict hierarchy among the US military
The US military is a strict hierarchy armed force. Simply put, there are only three roles that make up the US military: officers, non-commissioned officers and soldiers. During the Vietnam War, the US military paid great attention to this system, and until today the US military was affected by this system.
Instructors in the "Crucible"
The main sources of US military officers are graduates of famous military academies such as Reserved Officers Training Corps (ROTC), Officers Candidate School (OCS), and West Point Military Academy. Among them, the reserve officer training camp is a program where college students participate in military service immediately after graduation. As long as they enter the US military through this program, they will directly obtain the rank of second lieutenant; the alternate officer school is a training institution within the US military, which is only open to experienced non-commissioned officers and outstanding soldiers. When students pass the training of the alternate officer school, they will be promoted to second lieutenant and become a formal officer; as for graduates of famous military academies such as West Point, they will basically not become grassroots officers, but will enter the command department after a period of "internship". In addition, some people with special professional skills will be directly appointed as officers after joining the army, such as military doctors, pilots and ground crews.
West Point Military Academy cadet
Most of the instructors who train new recruits are non-commissioned officers. In order to complete the orders issued by the officers, non-commissioned officers must ensure the execution of soldiers. Therefore, non-commissioned officers who perform the training of new recruits have very strict requirements for new recruits. During the training process, they scold soldiers with rough and filthy words, which is actually simulating the high-pressure environment on the battlefield.
Not all non-commissioned officers are as barbaric as the instructors in the "Crucible" training camp. In the official army, non-commissioned officers are relatively tolerant of soldiers. For example, some soldiers will drink and gamble in the barracks, and non-commissioned officers will turn a blind eye when they see it. After all, relying on personal power to interfere may damage the non-commissioned officers' own authority.Of course, there are special circumstances. If an officer goes to the camp to inspect, the non-commissioned officer will play the role of blackface and impose moderate punishment on the soldiers.
clubs are all divided into three categories
If you want to know the real US military, you can't avoid the clubs opened for the US military. Most clubs are only open to specific soldiers, such as officers' clubs that are open for officers and soldiers' clubs that are open for soldiers. Only in some places without conditions will officers share a club, and in these clubs, you can also have a glimpse of the strict hierarchy of the US military.
US military club located in a certain part of Southeast Asia
The decoration of the officer club is generally relatively simple, and officers of different classes often win over their relationship with their comrades and friends in these clubs. Take senior officers as an example. They like to sit outside and talk in a low voice, trying to stay away from low-level officers, but they are sometimes not quiet at all. For example, senior officers who graduated from West Point Military Academy, they do not go to the bar themselves, but like to call waiters by tapping tableware with West Point graduation commemorative rings, so they are also called "Ring Knocker".
It seems that the beer tastes good
Most of the ring guests are very arrogant. They look down on the officers who graduated from the alternate officer school and the reserve officer training camp from the heart, believing that they either have no military command level or have no education. Therefore, when low-level officers are in the club, they will try to be as close as possible to avoid interfering with the ringmen. After all, the ringmen's ranks are not low.
NCOs also have their own club, and the atmosphere will be much better. It is worth noting that in any US military unit, the decoration of a non-commissioned officer club is definitely more particular than that of an officer club, because these non-commissioned officers are the backbone of the US military unit and often need to support each other on the front line. Therefore, clubs used by non-commissioned officers to win over their relationship cannot be made up.
US military clubs located in a certain area of Southeast Asia
As for soldiers' clubs, they are relatively simple. For example, using metal dining trays as the main tableware, the cups for drinking are also plastic mugs. But the soldiers didn't care much about this, they could drink happily here. However, it is worth noting that few US soldiers from different units engage in friendship in the same soldier club: under the catalysis of alcohol, soldiers are likely to turn friendship into fights.
It can be seen that there is a very strict hierarchy within the US military. When training, recruits must strictly implement the orders of non-commissioned officers. Even clubs that allow soldiers to relax must be divided according to their ranks.
Epilogue
If the US military is compared to a factory, then these senior officers belong to the managers of the factory, responsible for formulating decisions and production plans, and delivering them to managers of various departments for execution. The person who plays the manager is grassroots officers. Grassroots officers will not hand over these decisions and production plans to workers for implementation, but will hand them over to the leaders of each working group, and the leaders will be assigned to different workers. The leaders and workers will be non-commissioned officers and soldiers.
This phenomenon is rare in the official US military forces now
In addition, this factory is also a factory opened in a war zone. Everyone in the factory spends 80% of the time doing boring and boring work, and the remaining 20% of the time is extremely dangerous.
